CBGB – New York

There are few images that sum up punk rock and the New York City music scene as succinctly as the CBGB logo, emblazoned on the famous club’s awning. Opened by Hilly Kristal in 1973, CBGB quickly became arguably the world’s most celebrated venue and “underground” rock scene, welcoming legendary acts such as the New York Dolls, Blondie, the Ramones, Patti Smith, Talking Heads, Elvis Costello, the Cramps, the Dead Boys, the Misfits, the Voidoids, the Runaways and Joan Jett and the Blackhearts.

Hilly Krystals CBGB’s could once be found at 315 Bowery New York. Originally a run down bar frequented by Hells Angels it became in the mid seventies the home of US punk and alternative acts…ironic as  CBGB’s stands for “Country, Bluegrass, Blues and Other Music For Uplifting Gormandizers.”

How it came to feature punk is all down to the band Television finding the bar and playing it weekly from April 1974. From then on Patti Smith played followed by Blondie, The Ramones and Talking Heads. Since then nearly anybody who was anybody has played there.

Long and dark, CBGB’s was renowned for its tiny ten foot square stage. The audience was a mixture of arty types, hookers, band members and scenesters. As punk grew in popularity and infamy, so its clientele began to change to a more hardcore base.

A compilation album was recorded in June 1976 which apparently featured Blondie, Talking Heads etc which should have been a landmark historical record but those artists pulled out leaving Hilly with a second string of unrepresentative bands, who mostly stayed unsigned or did nothing.

CBGB’s like the other clubs mentioned here has become the stuff of legend. Sadly in 2006 it finished, a victim of rising rents and has become a clothes shop. And that was the end of Max’s Kansas City and CBGB.

Hilly himself passed away in August 2007 aged 75 years.

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